"Breeding-back" aims to restore or immitate extinct animals by selective breeding. This blog provides general information, the facts behind myths and news from various projects.

Monday, 26 June 2017

A response to a nonsensical blog article

Back in
2015, I had a slightly emotional rant about something that keeps on
entertaining especially the English-speaking world: the “nazi cow nonsense”. Such
an absurd headline is the result of people not caring about historical facts
and just wanting to be entertained by or to entertain with something that
sounds as absurd as a “nazi super cow”. A discreet tip: if you are about to
write a headline that ludicrous, you might take one moment and scrutinize.

Anyway, in
my 2015 article I covered the true motivation behind the Heck brothers’
attempts and the connection with single officials of the Nazi regime. Some
weeks ago, I was addressed to a blog article written one month after my 2015 article
that contains a lot of claims and mistakes that slightly upset me. I found no
commentary function so I use my own blog for writing a clarification. The
article has a nonsensical title, on the blog homidlikeme. I go over the
mistakes and wrong claims step by step. Why is it important to dismantle
defamations like that? Because it does have an effect on the world outside,
people working on project might develop objections against breeding-back or
breeds resulting from breeding-back as a result of these nonsensical stories,
so you might do real damage by spreading it.

First of
all, the author of the blog managed to misinterpret my graphic on Wikimediacommons showing a life restoration of an aurochs bull and cow. Although stated
very clearly, he mistook it for a comparison between an aurochs and a Heck bull
(obviously he cannot tell the difference between a male and female bovine).

Amusingly,
the author also assumes that aurochs were killed off in an act of self-defence
from those “un-friendly forest creatures”.

The author
of the article claims that the German dictator “suggested that resurrecting an
extinct megabeasts[sic] would be good for national morale (i.e. propaganda)”,
which is plain wrong, invented nonsense. There is no evidence that this man
ever heard of the project of the Heck brothers, not to mention ever spoke a sentence
containing “aurochs”. He did not know about the project, and if he would have
known, he would very likely not have cared about it. In contrast to Herman
Göring.

The author
further writes “Heinz and Lutz Heck were already keen on the idea of
reverse-engineering a copy of the extinct Aurochs, and the money and breeding
stock the Nazi war machine could provide as it steam-rolled over Europe gave them
everything they needed to get started”. Plain wrong, do your history homework
or at least read the Wikipedia article! The Heck brothers started their work in
the 1920s, and their motivation was free of any ideological nonsense and not
commanded from some Nazi official. While it is true that Lutz Heck actively
profited from having the hunting-fanatic Göring on his side, his brother Heinz,
whose stock is the base of all living Heck cattle, evidently avoided contact
with the regime.

With the
sentence “Heck cattle can reach a maximum height of 1.4m and a weight of 600kg,
which makes them one of the largest breeds of domestic cattle available”, the
author exposes his lack of basic knowledge about cattle. Those size data make
Heck cattle average, compared to modern day cattle of intensified agriculture
actually smaller, cattle. He probably never stood next to a living bull if he
considers the height of 1.4 that gigantic.

Then, the
author quotes the statement of UK farmer Derek Gow saying that his Heck herd
were the most aggressive animals he ever worked with. I already discussed the
temperament of Heck cattle in this post. Cattle behaviour depends a lot on
socialisation, also in Heck cattle. If you take Heck cattle from a grazing
project, that are used to have a lot of space and are not used to being handled
like farm cows, and you do not have experience in keeping cattle stemming from
those circumstances, you should not be surprised that you are unable to handle
them.

Now I want
to address a few words to the author directly: claiming that the Heck brothers
attempts were “performed in a grossly unethical way” baseless and does not make
any sense, claiming the breed has a “genocidal past” is a repelling defamation
and an insult to all grazing projects and Heck cattle breeders working with
this cattle breed. You might not be aware of this, but writing stories like
that can actually do real damage to actual projects in the world outside. So
next time before writing something absurd like “nazi super cows”, please do the
required homework or just keep your mouth closed.

Ironically
you write “Heck cattle have struggled to overcome their association with the
Nazi regime”. Exactly, because of people behaving like you.

About this blog

This blog is on everything related to the so-called “breeding-back” of extinct animals: From the extinct animals themselves, over their often domestic descendants and dedomestication to news and facts about various breeding-back projects, reports and photos from my own breeding-back related trips. I try to have a balanced and fact-based approach to this subject and to dismantle many of the popular myths. Enjoy!

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About me

My major interest always have been extinct animals, from dinosaurs to Pleistocene megafauna and more recent extinctions. Besides that I am interested in evolution, genetics and ecology.
I am also an amateur animal artist, making drawings and models mostly of extinct animals.